THE yawning gulf between rich and poor in Wales is sending people in the country's most deprived areas to an early grave, official figures have shown.

And despite the rhetoric and emergence of policies designed to address the problem of health inequalities and get disadvantaged children fit and healthy, little has changed since devolution.

Official statistics show that the death rate for people living in the most deprived parts of Wales is almost twice that of those in the most affluent areas of the UK.

And Wales' chief medical officer, Dr Tony Jewell, said the gap between those with the best health and those with the worst is widening.

The gap between rich and poor, the haves and have-nots, is even more evident in people's life expectancy - a boy born in Chelsea and Kensington can expect to live to the age of 82.2 years, compared with just 74.2 in Blaenau Gwent.

Mike German, Welsh Liberal Democrats Assembly leader AM for South East Wales, said, "This is the class divide at its most brutal.

"Society as a whole needs to address this issue as a matter of urgency, otherwise we are condemning a generation of Welsh children to an early grave."

Although well established, the links between deprivation and ill health are complicated and stretch beyond the fact that people in deprived areas have poorer overall lifestyles.

In addition to being more likely to smoke and drink to excess, they often have poorer access to healthy food and health services.

But housing, lower educational achievement and lower employment rates also contribute to the growing health inequalities.

Recent figures published by the Office for National Statistics state that, between 1999 and 2003, compared with the most affluent areas, in the most deprived areas:

the death rate for circulatory diseases for women is almost three times higher;

the death rate from ischaemic heart disease is five-and-a-half times higher for women (three- and-a-half times higher for men);

the death rate for stroke is 1.5 times higher;

male death rates from colorectal cancer increase with deprivation;

the death rate for lung cancer is 3.7 times higher;

the death rate for men from respiratory diseases was more than five times higher; and

death rates from accidents increase with deprivation, especially among the 15 to 64 age group.

Wales has a history of ill health and chronic conditions mainly due to its industrial past - respiratory disease, heart problems and diabetes are highly prevalent across the country.

But it is thought that the added and massive impact of deprivation is exacerbating the differences between the socioeconomic groups.

Dr Jewell said, "Health inequalities is a global, European and national issue.

"Health improvement and narrowing of health inequalities between social groups will be achieved primarily by economic, social, environmental and public health policy rather than by medical or other personal health care services."

The Welsh Assembly Government said it has invested significantly in a range of initiatives to reduce health inequalities, including coronary heart disease projects, food co-ops and Health Challenge Wales.